Tribute In LightÂ will shine from Dusk to Dawn to honor all those who lost their lives on September 11, 2001 and to serve as a symbol of hope for the city of New York. An iconic gesture of remembrance is officially deemed a public artwork installation supported byÂ Governor Cuomo, Mayor Bloomberg, the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation, Battery park City Authority, The Municipal Art Society, and all the public, corporate, and private sponsors.

According to the Tribute in Light website:
“Conceived in the aftermath of the September 11th tragedies, Tribute in Light is a temporary artistic gesture bringing together the vision and talent of numerous individuals who, shortly after the attacks, independently envisioned two beams of light rising from downtown New York. Finding support for their ideas, they joined forces in the spirit of the rescue and recovery effort downtown. The creative team consists of architects John Bennett and Gustavo Bonevardi of PROUN Space Studio, artists Julian LaVerdiere and Paul Myoda, architect Richard Nash Gould, and lighting designer Paul Marantz. Production support was provided by two non-profit cultural institutions The Municipal Art Society and Creative Time, with the assistance of Battery Park City Authority.”

When not in use, the entire installation is stored within the Battery Park City Garage until their annual commemorative use.

The blue beams, which are reported to beÂ visibleÂ for 60 miles, are comprised of 88Â separate 7,000-wattÂ searchlights, which are powered by a gas-run generator housed in a tractor trailer just outside of the parking garage.

When we first opened our digital doors to the community as Battery-Park.com, we knew that we wanted to help give a platform to our community by the time of the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. With very little money, but a lot of passion, we’ve worked hard to build the site and bring information to our neighborhood.

The core reason we launched BatteryParkCity.com was to create a digital community to connect the neighborhood that we love. In the past year, we’ve gotten to know our neighbors better through this site, Facebook, and Twitter.

Behind the scenes, we’ve been hard at work to make sure we offer better access to the growing online community at BatteryParkCity.com. Interestingly, we’ve watched a few things happen both inside and out:

A growing percentage of our readers are viewing the site through iPads and iPhones.

Our contributors and writers have experienced some speed bumps in terms of publishing posts.

Some of our favorite areas of the sites were virtual crickets — despite the personal attachment, love, and attention we gave those areas

So we went back to the lab and tried to accommodate for the growing pains and learnings. Today, as our way of honoring the community on the 10th Anniversary of September 11th, we mark the official relaunch of BatteryParkCity.com.

Some new features launched today:

BatteryParkCity.com is optimized for mobile viewing and commenting: Our site is now optimized for the growing lot of you that are viewing from tablets and mobile phones. (It’s a lot of you.)

Facebook Connect: We love all the Facebook comments we receive, and its become a huge part of what makes our site great. So we’ve enabled a way to offer seamless commenting for our FB friends.

Redesign of our Newsletter: We’ve redesigned and updated our newsletter to offer more news/alerts/events/promotions for those who want the information as fast as we get it. Please sign up if you aren’t already receiving it.

Last but not least — as our way of honoring the community at large and as our way of paying tribute to the last 10 years we have lived through together — we would like to make an announcement:

BatteryParkCity.com will be offering free advertising support for selected businesses who have served our community since September 11th, 2001.

As a community we rely on you to help serve our neighborhood. Several great and beloved businesses within our community have lost their fight to stay here. This year alone we’ve watched more than a handful of our favorite businesses shut their doors for good. We always envisioned BatteryParkCity.com as a means to help our community — residents and businesses alike — to stay committed to the resurgence of the neighborhood.

We hope to be able to lend a hand and provide support for those small business owners who share our unending commitment to Battery Park City. Interested businesses should contact us.

We were never here to make money: We’re here to make a difference. We hope that together we can do that.

The City is preparing for the annual September 11th commemoration ceremony at the National September 11 Memorial at the World Trade Center site. At this time, we would like to share with you detailed information regarding the upcoming ceremony, including street closures, traffic, parking and pedestrian impacts.

The commemoration for family members will take place on Sunday, September 11th from 6:30 AM until 4:00 PM. Following a moment of silence at 8:46 AM, the names of the victims will be read with music as a backdrop throughout the program. Additionally there will be a total of five moments of silence: 9:03 AM, 9:36 AM (Pentagon), 9:59 AM, 10:03 AM (Flight 93), and 10:28 AM. During the ceremony, families will be allowed to visit the 9/11 Memorial for the first time. The Tribute in Light will begin at sundown.

Given the limited vehicle and pedestrian access in the immediate area of the World Trade Center site and Lower Manhattan vicinity on September 11th, we encourage you and your fellow residents, tenants, employees and outside guests to do the following in preparation:

Avoid scheduling deliveries on Sunday, September 11th until after 8:00 PM.

Residents and employees should carry verification of home or business address at all times.

Minimize car service pickups on September 11th. Traffic along Broadway is expected to be heavy.

Use public transportation whenever possible to stations outside of the event area. Please note:

MTA passengers should plan for the Cortlandt Street R station to be bypassed from 7:00 AMto early afternoon and check the MTA website at www.mta.info for updates on bus routes and service.

PATH passengers should plan for suspended service to and from the World Trade Center and restricted access to the WTC Path Station from approximately 7:00 AM to 11:00 AM.

Asphalt Green’s, the iconic Upper East Side community center is set to open the doors to its Lower West Side location – right here in Battery Park City. To prepare for its long awaited opening, the facility is offering neighborhood residents special charter membership rates in the brand new 52,000 square foot facility. Although the exact costs of charter membership are not well publicized, residents are encouraged to take advantage of the limited time only charter membership costs.

Yup, you read that second to last bullet right – the Asphalt Green facilities brings a Culinary Arts center in which family friendly classes will be offered to establish healthy eating habits along with all the healthy fitness activities the neighborhood will be partaking in. Cultural Arts will also be a core programming offering in collaboration with the Battery Park City Parks Conservancy. Cultural Arts classes will be held which include art, music, dance, science, nature and other family friendly activities.

For more information call 212.586.8779 or email agbpc@asphaltgreen.org.

Jay Fine, BatteryParkCity.com’s favorite and often featured photographer, is showcasing his Fine photography in an exhibit entitled, “The End of Manhattan.”

With Lower Manhattan as his muse, Jay Fine will be exhibiting his work which includes his iconic shot of the Statue of Liberty struck by lightning, an image that had received critical praise in media outlets internationally.

Along with Antonio Petracca’s “10”, Fine’s “The End of Manhattan” opens at the Kim Foster Gallery on September 8th from 6pm-8pm. Both exhibits will be displayed through October 15th.

Antonio Petraccaâ€™s new exhibition “10” is a journey that started with 9/11. Petracca a Battery Park City resident, who was displaced and living in a hotel, felt compelled to begin a new series of paintings that responded to the tragedy of 9/11. The mission of Petracca’s exhibit is to depict the destruction, the sense of great loss and, more importantly, the can-do spirit of rebuilding and renewal that most New Yorkers felt at the time.

On the flip side, Jay Fine’s exhibit “The End of Manhattan” might have a dire name, but is more meditative view on the photographer’s life in Battery Park City than a 9/11 commemoration.Â Included in the show is 60×40 inch version of the aforementioned Statue of Liberty and Lightning photo, which was more recently featured in the August 2011 National Geographic Magazine.

According to Fine, “The exhibits compliment each other and should generate, we hope, a lot of interest, not just from the people who liver here but from folks around the world.Â Some of the greatest responses to my work are from France, Italy and South East Asia based on the feedback from my Facebook page and Flickr site.”

The exhibit itself is pegged to be a Downtown family affair, Â with the framing of the prints done by Battery Park City residents and owners of the World Trade Art Gallery, Jane and Doug Smith. The large scale prints were made by Joseph Ng, whose wife works in the Financial District.

The Kim Foster Gallery is located at 529 W 20th Street, New York.
For more information please check the galleryâ€™s website: www.kimfostergallery.com/

There is a certain poeticism when you think about the ground that Battery Park City is built on. Nearly four decades ago – Battery Park City was merely a concept born from the construction of the World Trade Center. Troublesome to remove landfill from the World Trade Center was more of a nuisance than a deliberate urban plan. Either way, the gaping holes from the World Trade Center site Â gave rise to an urban planning precedence of a self encompassed city development. It is also poignant to note hat a city born to live within the shadows and the rise of the Twin Towers will forever live in the shadows of those same buildings tragedy.

Past, present and future aside – Nearly forty years later, the vision of Battery Park City is complete, and a final milestone in our community is overshadowed by the 10 year anniversary of September 11th.

The last two parcels of land, now have a name – Liberty Luxe and Liberty Green. The final twin-like installations of residential complexes have finished construction and will officially round out our population to nearly 13,000 in Battery Park City limits proper.

According to the Architectural Record, who has noted this small milestone,Â “After weathering several recessions, leadership changes, and September 11, BPC now covers roughly two dozen city blocks and contains more than 13,000 residents, 9 million square feet of commercial space, and several civic and cultural venues. â€œThe buildings have a much more interesting program than we planned,â€ Eckstut says, citing Stuyvesant High School (Cooper, Robertson & Partners, 1992) and the Museum of Jewish Heritage (Kevin Roche John Dinkeloo and Associates, 1997). â€œThese departures have made it more of a real city.â€

BPCâ€™s showpiece is the 1.5-mile-long waterfront esplanade, which features a plaza, marina, and views of the Statue of Liberty. Another vital community amenity: the Cesar Pelliâ€“designed Winter Garden (1988), where free public events are presented year-round.

BPCâ€™s success is attributable to its sustainable aspects. A dozen projects have received or are expected to receive LEED certification, but as Cooper notes, the neighborhoodâ€™s most important â€œgreenâ€ features â€” open space, density, and proximity to transit â€” prefigured the sustainability discourse by decades.

Officially, Battery Park City’s official 30th birthday is still up in the air. Â For those who consider the 1982 Battery Park City’s birthday when it opened its doors to commercial businesses, Battery Park City’s anniversary will be next year. However, if you consider the first residential move-ins as the mark of the Â neighborhood, then 2015 is your celebratory year.

A far cry from the beachfront property that Lower Manhattan seemed to enjoy that hardly resemble the city we know and love now.

Flooded Battery Park (Credit: Michael Appleton for The New York Times)

With a collective sigh of relief, our neighborhood is safe. For the hours we lost in our homes, Battery Park City gained a few things in return. We’ve got our…

“Top 5 Things Battery Park Residents Learned from Hurricane Irene.”

(No. 5) So that’s what happens to Battery Park City in a Hurricane!
Battery Park City has only been existence shy of celebrating its dirty 30. We’ve lived through some pretty tremendously historical times.Â Yet, most of us before this weekend hardly knew of the dangers we faced should our lovely esplanade meet its nemesis Hurricane.Â How many of us knew what happened in 1821? Thank goodness for historical records and those crazy people that keep them!

(No. 4) Irene in Battery Park City will have more eyes than Lady Gaga at the VMA’s
Our neighborhood didn’t need to wear a meat dress, but we sure didn’t win the wet T-shirt contest either.

(No. 3) If the apocalypse ever dawns on Battery Park City — Hudson Produce will still stay open.
Cause someone’s gotta sell the RedBull, and someone’s gonna buy it for 3x the MSRP!

(No. 2) Rain, Sleet or Snow — when a dog’s gotta go, a dog’s gotta go.
Was this Zone A or Zone Pee? The pooper scoopersÂ may have fled but that didn’t stop dogs from evacuating all over the evacuation zone.

(No. 1) Battery Park City has no parking problems when we all evacuate.
Like a scene out of a zombie movie, Sunday was every Battery Park City car owners dream. Too bad no one was here to experience it!

Evacuations were called amidst concerns of major storm surges that would cause massive flooding, forcing power outages in our area – on top of a lack of public transportation to our largely isolated neighborhood. However, all restrictions were lifted today at 3pm.

â€¢ Power and steam pipes have not been shut off as initially planned by Con Ed.
â€¢ Elevators at some buildings have been restored including the Liberty Buildings, 1 Rector Park; Gateway Plaza elevators still off.
â€¢ Residents of all buildings in Battery Park City should return to their homes.
â€¢ 6-8 Inches of flooding reported across areas of Battery Park City
â€¢ Â West Side Highway and FDR is reopened.
â€¢ Brooklyn/Battery Tunnel is open for those who want to re-enter Battery Park from the Brooklyn/Queens area.
â€¢ MTA is still shut down according to Aaron Donovan Wont’ reallly be able to start the process until it is completely safe. Still outstanding concerns of flooding/sea water effecting underground tunnels. Too early to pronounce whether public transportation will be restored in time for Monday’s rush hour.
â€¢ Area is still very windy, but not unusually windy for Battery Park City, flooding not seen on both ends of South End Avenue and on areas closest to West Side Highway for those who want to return.